


Not the Fall

by tirsynni



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Loki (Marvel) Needs a Hug, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-07-25 20:22:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16204985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tirsynni/pseuds/tirsynni
Summary: It was never the fall that hurt Loki the most, be it falling through space or falling behind.





	Not the Fall

His first memory of Thor was chasing his brother in Frigga’s garden. The bushes towered over him, and centuries later, he remembered their scent: sweet and soft and  _ alive _ . Thor laughed, just out of sight, and Loki’s small legs stumbled trying to keep up.

Loki remembered shouting, but he couldn’t remember what he said. The memory of Thor’s laughter proved too strong, drowning out all other sounds.

“Catch up, Loki! Catch up!” his brother shouted, somewhere beyond the bushes. His high voice trembled with laughter and exertion. 

No matter how hard Loki tried, he could never remember if he caught Thor or how that day ended.

xoxoxox

When he awoke on Sakaar, he was alone. The slavers came quickly, but Loki hid with magic and soon, confused and annoyed, they left again. In the trash heaps, Loki waited, using his power to both hide and to reach out, to search.

No Thor. No Bifrost. No Hela or any sign from Asgard.

No Thor.

Day became night and back to day and Loki waited, gaze still searching. On the third day, he drew himself up and headed for Sakaar’s shining pinnacle.

It took him nine days in all to accept that Thor was dead.

xoxoxox

When they were young, of the same height and Asgard still shone golden and beautiful for them both, Loki turned into a snake and stabbed Thor.

Loki ran off, laughing, Thor’s blood dripping from the dagger in his hand. Thor roared like a lion’s cub and charged after him while their nursemaid shrieked at them both, running close behind. Thor’s bleeding shoulder left a gory trail behind him, and the wound made it difficult to clamber after Loki as he climbed over rocks and into trees, his laughter wild in the air.

The aftermath was a whirlwind of confusion, furious shouts interspersed with praises from Frigga about Loki’s magic and someone telling Loki not to be cowardly and Loki asking if that meant he should just stab Thor face-to-face. Loki never apologized, and Thor whispered to him later that he made a very nice snake, even if their nurse didn’t seem to think so.

Odin never said anything about it.

xoxoxox

“I am called the Silvertongue,” Loki said, with a smooth smile and dead eyes, and he made his new home in Sakaar. He was always adaptable, after all.

Sakaar greeted him with drunken laughter and shining lights and mouths as poisonous as his own. Many touched and reached but Loki held himself still, apart, until the Grandmaster himself came.

“ _ Silvertongue _ ,” he said, as if he could taste it, and Loki smiled because  _ Odinson _ and  _ Thorsbrottir _ was dead. He didn’t share the other names --  _ Liesmilth, Sly One, World Walker _ \-- and let the Grandmaster take his hand.

He was the first to take Loki to bed on Sakaar but not the last. A whole new world of chaos,  _ his _ kind, and Loki laughed and drank and fucked and let Sakaar’s madness sweep him away, let its laughter drown out where Thor’s should have been.

xoxoxox

With a laugh, Thor smacked Loki’s hand away, and Loki jerked back at the sting. “You fuss like a maiden, Brother! How can any warrior say nay to such an adventure?”

Loki couldn’t remember falling into Thor’s shadow but he remembered when he realized he was trapped in it. He watched Thor walk away from him, toward Lady Sif and the Warriors Three, and his hand still stung even as the light bruise finished healing. Thor looked back -- Thor looked back, he always looked back, and that made everything impossibly worse -- and called to Loki, still laughing at a joke he thought Loki found funny.

“Come, Brother!” he called and turned away and his shadow stretched so very far behind him.

By the time Loki shook himself awake and went to join his brother, Thor had already led the others outside, his laughter the only trail for Loki to follow.

xoxoxox

Sakaar became a playground like Asgard never was, even when Loki ruled it as false king. Loki fucked as man and woman and drank in his audience’s delighted gasps and croons. In the Grandmaster’s bed, he turned blue for the first time and exulted in the Grandmaster’s mouth trailing over the strange lines on his skin. The Grandmaster chuckled against him and whispered, as if talking not to Loki but the odd, cold marks.

_ See, Thor _ ? he wanted to say, but Thor was never there.

Loki turned but no matter how full, how loud Sakaar was, there was always an odd, quiet spot where Thor’s presence and laughter was supposed to be.

_ See, Thor? _ But the fool never, ever saw.

Sakaar offered countless delights and Loki had a shape and a word for them all. He laughed loud and clear to drown out the silence growing every day.

Around him, drunken voices raised, too, a planet of liars pretending they weren’t lying. Loki’s perfect place.

xoxoxox

Trapped on Thanos’s  _ Sanctuary _ , Loki screamed his brother’s name. Despite the battle which had raged between them days/months/years/ _ centuries _ ago, Thor was still  _ Big Brother _ . If Thor heard him crying, he would come. Big brother would come. Big brother would fix things. Big brother would come and the pain would stop and Loki could go home.

Yet when he screamed, only Thanos came. Why would Thor come after all? Thanos asked. Why  _ why why _ \--

Thor, who reached for him when he fell and Thor would catch him this time, he  _ would _ \--

Thor, who didn’t reach, who watched him fall to Thanos and did  _ nothing _ \--

Thor, who pushed him to his fate.

When Loki stopped screaming for Thor and just screamed and screamed, Thanos came again. He extended his hand and the world glowed blue and the pain quieted.

Far away, the screams finally quieted in Thor’s dreams. He stopped going to Odin with his vows that he could hear his brother, and Odin stopped turning him away with cold admonishments to leave the dead  _ dead _ .

Soon the only screaming left was in Loki’s mind, and the dead came back.

xoxoxox

Nine and nine and nine later, Thor came back. 

When he left again, leaving Sakaar in flames behind him, Loki had no choice but to follow.

He should have known it was the end when he caught up.

**Author's Note:**

> For more Loki and fandom, check me out on [tumblr](http://tirsynni.tumblr.com/).


End file.
